The Team

Owners / Managing Partners

Alex is joint owner of East Coast Divers, and began diving at the age of 13. He is the lead service technician, director of technical education and part of Redbull Cliff Diving U.S. safety team.

Nick FazahManaging Partner

Nick is joint owner of East Coast Divers and began diving at the age of 13. He is the director of Freediving education as well as all of our SSI courses. He is also the lead of the Redbull Cliff Diving U.S. safety team.

Our Valuable Dive Center Team

PJ ConcannonStore Manager

PJ joined the ECD team in October of 2017 as a member of the internship program. Soon thereafter, he took on the Store Manager role. He completed his Open Water certification with ECD in 2016 and has continued to progress as a diver. PJ’s only complaint with diving is that he can’t carry all his gear on the back of his motorcycle!

Bill McCormickManager / Director of Operations

Bill fell in love with diving after getting certified in 2006 while on leave from working as a security contractor in Iraq. He then received his instructor certification in Curacao and spent the next 3 years as a scuba instructor there. He met his wife there, and after an extended surface interval to finish his education, he has rejoined the diving community as East Coast Divers’ Facility Operations Manager and instructor in January 2018.

Kim MalkoskiManager / Director of Training

Kim has always had a passion for the water. Her entire family are all active divers and have long participated with the local prestigious dive club, The Boston Sea Rovers. Kim was first introduced to the professional world of diving when she won the Boston Sea Rovers Intern Scholarship in 2009.

Jane SellersMarketing and Web Team

Jane moved to Boston in January 2017 for the ECD marketing internship and now works on all of our marketing and web functions. Jane has been diving for two years and will happily talk about sharks for hours with anyone who gives her the chance.

Warren CohenRepair Technician

Warren joined the ECD team in fall of 2016. He has a mind for building and can fix just about anything that comes into the shop for repair. When he is not in the repair room, Warren loves technical diving, jazz music, and long walks on short piers in dive gear.

Our Valuable Team of Dive Professionals

Jake BasileInstructor

Jake has been diving since 2014. Despite the recent start, Jake has earned his instructor certification with an impressive commitment to local diving. He is in the water significantly more than not. Jake’s diving interests including lobstering, scalloping and wreck diving.

Ken AppleDive Control Specialist

Ken started diving in 1991 and hasn’t been able to stop ever since. He is one of the most comfortable divers you will ever see in the water. That comfort washes right over any other diver in the water with him. Its one of the key characteristics that makes him such a fantastic divemaster.

Patrick DanielsDiveCon Instructor / Public Safety Director

Patrick originally was certified as a scuba instructor by Alex and Nick in 2008 at the International Diving Career Institute at Hall’s. Before that he was a skilled tradesman and his attention to detail shows through in his instructional techniques. Pat now directs the Public Safety division of ECD.

Tom GaitleyDive Control Specialist Instructor

Tom’s been teaching diving since the 80’s and taught for East Coast Divers back then! Now that Tom’s daughter Kate is a dive professional (and also works with us) Tom has gotten back in his fins and has been teaching classes with us again since 2011. He loves working with new divers and has a passion for photography both above and below the water.

Kat DeStefanoDive Control Specialist Instructor

Kat has been teaching scuba for more than 15 years. Along with teaching scuba Kat is also an active boat captain, a sea turtle rescue volunteer and a yoga instructor. Kat loves to stay active and loves to teach people new healthy lifestyle activities.

Mack McBrineDive Control Specialist Instructor

Mack started his diving career back in 2009 with ECD. He’s spent a lot of time exploring the New England coast and had logged over 1oo “cold water” dives before dipping his fins in warmer water. Mack loves to teach, with a calm and easy going nature, and fantastic underwater knowledge, he puts even the most anxious diver at ease.

Julian HonmaProduct Specialist / Freediving Instructor

Julian started freediving in 2012, a year after getting his scuba certification at East Coast Divers. After attending the Wednesday Night Training for almost two years, he started running them and quickly rose through the rank to become a Freediving Instructor. Julian is very involved in keeping the New England freediving community active, he enjoys doing photography (above and under water) and playing saxophone in his spare time.

Liz CzokDive Control Specialist instructor

Liz is a very talented marine biologist who has been working with East Coast Divers since 2011. Liz teaches classes when she’s home but spends most of her time travelling around the caribbean on a diving live-a-board educating guests on the differences between marine creatures and identifying that one fish they couldn’t figure out what it was.

Aleksey AverinDive Control Specialist Instructor

Aleksey loves to work with students. No instructor spent more time teaching in both 2013 and 2014 than Aleksey. When he’s not teaching you’ll probably find him working on his Hollis Prism 2 rebreather or researching a new deep wreck he’ll be diving on soon.

Tony RufoScuba Instructor

Tony has been teaching scuba for almost 5 years and in that time he hasn’t gone more than a couple weeks without teaching a session in the pool or tutoring students in class sessions. Tony Loves to teach scuba especially knowing that he can help develop someones else’s love of the sport.

Paul AdlerInstructor Trainer

Paul started East Coast Divers in his father’s garage in the early 1970’s. By 1980, Paul had expanded to 3 stores across Massachusetts and one of the largest dive operations in the North East. Over the years Paul consolidated his store into the flagship facility in Brookline where it still is today. Even after selling the dive center in 2012 he still teaches.

Eric RosenkrantzScuba Instructor

Eric is one of our primary instructors. Not only does he compete for the most teaching hours each year he is also one of our best instructors. Eric always has a fun relaxed attitude that other divers love to be around. He is always excited to be teaching new students skills and take them on dives.

Whitey BaunScuba / Freediving Instructor

Whitey is one of our core freediving instructors. Whitey has been involved in the dive industry for most of his life and doesn’t show any signs of slowing down. He’s taught scuba for more than 30 years but has recently become an avid freediver in the past 15 years. He has recently earned his freediving instructor cert and now teaches many of the classes at ECD.

Barrett FranklinScuba Instructor

Barrett loves sharing diving with everyone he meets. From vast reefs in the Maldives to wreck diving in the St. Lawrence seaway. Barrett finds the thrill of sharing a diving adventure with friends one of the best parts of the sport. His passion comes through in every student he trains.

Jessica NobleScuba Instructor

Jess was originally certified in California in August of 2006. A natural diver from the start, it didn’t take long for Jess to continue her passion for diving. In the summer of 2013 Jess completed her Dive Guide training with ECD and was seen leading almost every shore dive there after. Now that she’s a DiveCon you’ll find her teaching new divers at pool sessions.

Kim MurrayScuba Instructor

Kim came to ECD in 2012 and quickly progressed to become one of our most active instructors. With a degree in education and many years experience teaching children, it is no surprise that Kim is the primary instructor for our Scuba Rangers program and kids specialties. Even with a very active teaching schedule, Kim is always sure to leave time for fun diving, and baking treats to for her dive buddies.

Suzanne de BoerScuba Instructor

Suzanne hails from the Netherlands and started diving in 2007. She took her Open Water in Egypt (the Netherlands was too cold). In 2009, Suus moved to Curacao and became a dive instructor. While living in Curacao, Suus met her husband at the dive shop and in 2012 they moved to Arizona. In 2016 they moved to Boston where Suus was excited to get back into diving. She is now one of our most active instructors!

Kate GaitleyProduct Specialist / Instructor

Kate interned at East Coast Divers and obtained her Dive Guide certification with us in 2014. We think she spent more time under the water during her internship than above. In her heart, she is a cold-water, New England diver but will admit to enjoying diving the warm waters of the Caribbean.

Andrew NovikovScuba Instructor

Andrew began diving in 2009 while on vacation in Mexico. First thing he did after returning to Boston was signing up for the open water course at the local dive shop. Since then he dove off the shores of all continents except Antarctica, in caves of Mayan Riviera, and under ice of Lake Winnipesaukee in New England.

Christian PonceScuba Instructor

A year after certification Chris was back on the beach learning to rescue and a year after that he was nipping at the bud to climb the ranks of the Dive Pro world. Although he professes to love only warm water you can find him diving all over New England throughout the season. Chis is a very active diver, trainer and photographer.

Larry DaveyScuba Instructor

Larry is one of our best instructors for anyone who has anxiety about diving or being in the water. His personality and approached are fun filled and incredibly relaxed. Larry has also been teaching for over 10 years and still loves it today as much as ever.

John MajorisFreediving Instructor

John’s an avid marine biologist currently working on his PhD at BU. When he’s not chasing fish around the world he likes to spend his time freediving, cave diving, enjoying the ocean.

Steve NaceScuba Instructor

Steve has been a dive enthusiast and instructor for years. The best part for Steve is to have the ability to take all the tips and techniques he’s learned over the years and pass them on to his students to make them great divers right off the bat.

Doug GrahamScuba Instructor

Doug Graham has been diving for almost a decade. He first caught the diving bug while on vacation in the Carribean but after moving to Boston about 6 years ago he fell in love with the New England waters.